Friday, 11 November 2011

The batch of Commandos that are in the shops now, as well as including the reprint of the original Issue 2 from 50 years ago, also has two brand new stories set during the First World War. On the eleventh day of the eleventh month it therefore seems appropriate to review one of those Great War Commando stories, issue 4443 Killer In No-Man's-Land.

It is 1916 and Private Alan Roux is a runner for a British Infantry regiment on the front line in France. Carrying messages from his unit to other units on the front line and to headquarters in the rear lines, his job exposes him to dangers that the other men in the regiment do not have to face. While popular with the majority of his colleagues he falls foul of the unit's bully, Lance-Corporal Paul Ryder, who tries his best to avoid battle. After a German raid on their trench, Ryder lies to his superiors to both cover up his own cowardice and to put Roux in front of a firing squad.

Written by Mac MacDonald, with internal art by Vila and a painted cover by Ian Kennedy, Killer In No-Man's-Land brings to life a remarkable array of characters in the issue's 135 panels from the quietly heroic Roux and his friends in the trench, his sympathetic Sergeant and Lieutenant, British snipers that he helps out, the bullying Ryder and his henchman, several French soldiers and even a captured German who gets to say rather more than "Kameraden!" Beginning with a condemned man's view of a firing squad, and knowing that Commando's 'standard operating procedure' is one-off stories, you simply do not know who amongst these many characters will live and who will die.

Vila's black and white line art is impressive with rarely a panel going by without multiple characters and background detail while Ian Kennedy's moodily coloured cover leaves the prospective reader deliberately unsure just what the British soldiers are going to be up against in no-man's land.

Commando 4443 - Killer In No-Man's-Land with its tightly plotted story, excellent array of characters, detailed internal art and a lovely atmospheric cover shows just why Commando has lasted for half a century.

Commando 4443 - Killer In No-Man's-Land is available now from WH Smiths, Easons and other newsagents for £1.50.You can read an 8 page preview of the issue at the official Commandowebsite.

Thursday, 10 November 2011

Continuing the Panel Borders comic radio show's month of programming about genre in comics, Alex Fitch talks to creators of small press and mainstream cowboy comics.

In the 300th radio show that Alex Fitch has made for Resonance FM, he talks to veteran comics writer John Ostrander about his classic serialised graphic novel The Kents featuring the history of Superman's great grandparents in 19th century Kansas and their encounters with the Luthors of the time, which is being re-released in three '100 page giants' this winter.

Alex and John also talk about Blaze of Glory: The Last Ride of the Western Heroes, Grimjack and his unrealized Doctor Who audio western.

Plus, in an interview recorded at this year's Bristol Small Press Expo, Tim Keable and Andrew Cheverton talk about their ongoing comic West, which has recently included horror tropes and guest artists plus their future plans for the title and its graphic novel collections.

• Tim Sale is an Eisner Award-winning comic book artist, perhaps best known for his comic work with collaborator Jeph Loeb. The duo produced popular work such as Batman: The Long Halloween, and Batman Dark Victory for DC, and comics starring characters such as Spider-Man, Daredevil, and Hulk for Marvel.
Tim's artwork has also appeared on the television programme Heroes, primarily in the form of the fictional comic book 9th Wonders. • Web: www.timsale1.com

• An Eisner Award-winning comic creator and founder of the Comicraft design and lettering studio, Richard Starkings is the creator of Hip Flask, The Elephantmen and his semi-autobiographical comic strip, Hedge Backwards. Born and raised in England, Starkings worked for five years at Marvel UK's London office as an editor, designer and occasional writer on Zoids, The Real Ghostbusters, Transformers and the Doctor Who comic strip.
Today he is perhaps best known for his work with the award-winning (and revolutionary) Comicraft, which he founded in 1992 with John 'JG' Roshell. Starkings & Roshell also co-authored the best-selling books Comic Book Lettering, The Comicraft Way and Tim Sale: Black and White. • Web: www.activeimages.com

• An American comic book writer, perhaps best known for penning DC's Birds of Prey, Gail Simone's other notable works include Secret Six, The All New Atom and Deadpool. In 2011 she became the writer for Batgirl as well as co-writer for The Fury of Firestorm.
Simone first came to fan attention with her website, Women in Refrigerators, listing many instances in which female comic book characters were the victims of violent attacks because of their gender, or whose attacks were used as plot device for a male character.
In 2009, Gail received the Friends of Lulu - Hall of Fame Award, and is a several-time nominee for the GLAAD award for portrayals of LGBT characters.

• Esad Ribic is a Croatian artist born in 1972. Working in comics since the early 1990s, he's spent most of his time on Marvel titles. His credits include Loki, Silver Surfer: Requiem and Sub-Mariner: Depths. Web: www.eribic.net

• Probably best known for the striking cover artwork he provides for the comic book industry, over the course of his 20+ plus years working as a professional artist, Adam Hughes's art has graced the covers of such well-known titles as Wonder Woman, Catwoman, Tomb Raider, as well as the interiors of books like Justice League of America, Legion of Superheroes, Maze Agency and Ghost, to name a few.
Adam's ability to render characters both naturalistically and with style and humor, have made him a one-of-a-kind in the industry. His illustrations have been featured as statues and graced with awards, both Harvey and Eisner. You can see a retrospective of Adam's DC Comics career in the recently published coffee table book, Cover Run: The DC Comics Art of Adam Hughes.• Web: www.justsayah.com

Jeff Lemire is a Canadian comic artist and writer whose work has been nominated for an Ignatz, a Harvey, and two Eisner Awards.
After self-publishing the Xeric Award-winning comic book Lost Dogs in 2005 via his Ashtray Press imprint, he produced the Eisner and Harvey Award-nominated Essex County for Top Shelf in 2008–2009.
In 2009 DC/Vertigo published Jeff's The Nobody, a two-colour tale of identity, fear and paranoia in a small community.
Lemire is currently writing and drawing the acclaimed post-apocalyptic DC/Vertigo series Sweet Tooth, and, following his relaunch of the Superboy series, is now writing the ongoing series Animal Man and Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E.• Blog: http://jefflemire.blogspot.com

(with thanks to David Roach and Tim Pilcher) An exhibition by little-known artist Roy Newby, whose work over many decades included numerous comics, will go on show at Phoenix Place in Lewes, East Sussex, later this month.

Roy's work displays an astonishing variety of
style and skill, from comic book illustration, recently seen at the
Vintage Festival, to fine oils and watercolours.

Described as "a creative inspiration", he was a versatile artist who made a quiet living illustrating comics
and magazines for children, teens and twenties, making technical
catalogues, painting advertising posters, designing fashion-plates, even
political banners, in fact, drawing anything you cared to name. For he
was a 'commercial artist', working from the age of 15 in the 1920s
until, in his late eighties, he finally stopped attending his weekly
life drawing class.

Robbie of Red Hall

David Roach tells us Roy, who died earlier this year aged 96, drew comics in the UK for almost 30 years, appearing in titles such as Girl, Tammy, Poppet, Judy and Valentine.

"He came from a time when you had to be able to draw just about anything, which he certainly could," David says. "While not drawing comics he painted, sketched, doodled and experimented with different styles and while his comic art was highly accomplished, it was never exactly experimental, unlike his paintings... [which] are absolutely stunning, classic examples of post-war realism, [showing] all sorts of influences - Cezanne, Picasso, Modigliani etc.

"Tragically, Roy died very recently before I or any comic historians could speak to him. If only I’d known it would have been fascinating to chat with someone from the golden age of British comics. He apparently never spoke to any comics fans about his career so it’s such a missed opportunity."

Comics writer Jim Alexander, whose credits include stories for 2000AD, DC and Marvel Comics and Metal Hurlant has been heavily involved with Glasgow-based publishers Black Hearted Press and is the writer on two new books that will be launched at Thought Bubble in Leeds later this month.

Co-founded by David Brayher, John Farman and Sha Nazir last year, Black Hearted Press is a new Scottish comic book publisher promoting new, exciting and diverse creator owned, collaborative comic books whose first release was Black Maria issue 616.

Building on that success, they've published three titles this year - Black Hearted Love, Laptop Guy and School of the Damned with contributions from Jim Alexander, Dave Alexander, Jim Devlin and Jack Lothian - and are now set to publish Gabriel and Scout One, both written by Jim.

A page from the first issue of Gabriel, drawn by David Hill

"Gabriel written by myself with art by David Hill, was published almost a decade ago by Caliber," he tells us. "Now serialised by BHP over four parts, it's the story of one man's isolation and dislocation, wrapped up in horror and religious themes, as a demon runs rampage through the streets of Glasgow - which seems as pertinent to me now as it did then. I'm firmly of the belief the strip deserves a second outing."

The back-up strip is 'Manchester', also written by Jim with art by Andy Dodd. The story is set at the end of the world. "For one man," says Jim, "the last day on Earth is quite possibly the happiest day of his life."

Also out is Scout One. "This is a super-hero strip with a difference," Jim reveals. "I know you've probably heard this a hundred times before, but artist Sha Nazir's lovely expressive art lends the story a gritty DC Thomson look, which never detracts from the three different storylines from three different time periods, chronicling the modern myth that is the super-hero known as Scout One.

"The story has a Doctor Who sensibility to it; there's a real sense of adventure and fun to be had. Something parents and kids can both enjoy."

• Gabriel #1 and Scout One #1 will also be on sale at Thought Bubble, Leeds, Saturday 19th and Sunday 20th November. Black Hearted Press will be sharing a table with the Burke & Hare team in Saviles Hall.

After mentioning Airfix's re-release of the Angel Interceptor kit from Gerry Anderson's Captain Scarlet And the Mysterons TV series, we have another Airfix/Captain Scarlet cross-over to report but this time it is one of the behind the scenes team.

Mike Trim joined the AP Films model shop in 1964 working as a model maker on Stingray and would continue on with the company through the Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet, Joe 90 and The Secret Service puppet series as well as the live action UFO plus the company's three feature films, Thunderbirds Are Go!, Thunderbird 6 and Doppleganger. He rose to be the assistant to the Anderson's Oscar winning special effects director Derek Meddings designing many of the familiar vehicles from the various series.

Mike then went on to design and paint the illustrations for the concept album Jeff Wayne's Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds and work as an illustrator of book covers. His story is told in the beautifully illustrated The Future Was FAB: The Art Of Mike Trim published by Hermes Press in 2006.

Since then Mike has been painting illustrations for Airfix when the company was revitalised after its takeover by Hornby. Mike's Airfix box art covers a wide range of subjects from warships like HMS Iron Duke from the Battle of Jutland in 1916 the RAF's WWII Wellington bomber. It is nicely appropriate that the designer and model maker of so many science fiction vehicles in the 1960s also provided Airfix with new paintings of the 1960s era Apollo-Saturn V moon rocket and Apollo Lunar Module.

There are more of Mike Trim's Airfix illustrations on his blog and much more on his work in general on his website.

Tuesday, 8 November 2011

Another four Commandos will be out this Thursday and as it’s November, thoughts turn towards the Armistice at the end of the Great War. So it's no surprise there's a pair of World War 1 stories in this set of release, one with a light-hearted feel.

There’s also the second from last in DC Thomson's first dozen re-issue series. Number 2 is seen for the first time in 20 years. Number 1 will re-appear on the 8th of December — just in time for Christmas.

Many strange battles were fought during the 1914-18 war but surely the strangest involved a pair of French regimental policemen, a squad of Australian infantrymen, a bunch of escaped German POWs…and a mediaeval stone tower.

The powerful Japanese Army was island-hopping its ruthless way down through the South Seas towards Australia. Many a brave Aussie soldier, standing his ground in the green hell of the island jungles, was bulldozed into eternity by the sheer weight of the Nipponese army.

And one Englishman in the Australian army was caught up in the desperate battle.
Bob Palmer he was christened, but COWARD was the name they branded him with. Coward, the word that turns a man into the loneliest being on earth, for what soldier seeks a coward for company?

But there was no craven blood in Bob Palmer’s veins — and he proved he was ready to spill every drop as he blasted Jap after Jap into kingdom come.

"This is a classic Commando tale," says Calum Laird, Commando Editor, of this reprint story. "A man who's the victim of a misunderstanding who has to prove his accuser wrong. And with plenty of action along the way to add some spice. That the two men are on the same side but different nationalities hardly matters nor that there’s a third character trying to be a peacemaker between them.

"What does matter is the use of the emotive word Coward in the title and through out the story. It’s one of those loaded words that can’t be spoken except without venom — as amply demonstrated here by Sergeant Fettis.

"Note to the 1961 Commando editor…the word Coward in the title is far too small, make it bigger."

It was going to be Captain David Poole’s toughest mission yet. Posing as a German spy he was to feed the Nazis with false information which would lead their forces into a trap.

Everything was going like clockwork until David met up with a certain Australian pilot — and then everything started to go terribly wrong.

"As I recall, Ken Gentry who penned this tale, was a South African newspaperman with a sideline in Commando stories," says Calum Laird. "I worked on a few of his over the years. Here he weaves a web of deceit with a double-crossing British agent, a straightforward Aussie pilot and a luckless German commander.

"Cecil Rigby who provided the inside art for the story had also worked on newspapers, as a very good caricaturist and he wasn’t bad at Commando either, having been in at the start.
"Ian Kennedy, who provided the cover, puts himself in the cockpit of every plane he draws. I hope he made an exception with this one — that looks like a painful crash."

• Commando is also available for iPad and iPhone. The apps are free to download through the Apple iTunes App Store and a digital subscription is priced at £4.99 per month, compared to a £99 annual print subscription. For those not sure there are four free issues to download prior to making a purchase.

Cinebook have been selective in their choices of Lucky Luke albums to translate into English, jumping around in the original French order and with Lucky Luke Versus The Pinkertons they have come completely up to date with their first English Lucky Luke book that was not created by Morris.

It is 1861 and Lucky Luke returns from a manhunt in Mexico to discover that his position of good guy bounty hunter has been usurped in his absence by Allan Pinkerton and his fledgling detective agency. With Pinkerton cosying up to President Lincoln, the President himself tells Luke that after all Luke's good deeds it is time for him to retire and hand over to the more modern methods of the Pinkerton Agency. Despite feeling unwanted he obeys this Presidential decree and watches as law and order slowly becomes unstuck around him. With the Daltons once again out of jail and gunning for Pinkerton, Luke sees the need to come out of retirement and do things the old way.

Lucky Luke was created by Morris (Maurice De Bevere) in 1946 for the Spirou comic magazine and he wrote and illustrated a total of nine albums by himself before Asterix's Rene Goscinny came on board as writer with his first story appearing in Spirou in 1955 . The pair produced 41 albums worth of Lucky Luke stories together. After Goscinny's death in 1977, Morris continued with a variety of different writers before he too passed away in 2001. Since then Achdé (Hervé Darmenton) has taken over the art chores and this is his fourth Adventures Of Lucky Luke book, as the non-Morris books are marketed, and the first with the writing team of Tonino Benacquista and Daniel Pennac in, as the book is at pains to point out, "the style of Morris."

Originally published in French in 2010 this was the first, and to date only, book by the new team so its theme of Luke's retirement before realising that he is still needed is somewhat appropriate. Indeed this concept of having Luke on the sidelines for a lot of the book means that it isn't so much Lucky Luke Vs The Pinkertons as 'The Daltons Versus The Pinkertons' and having Joe Dalton's fury, normally reserved for Luke, being aimed instead at Pinkerton is a neat twist on a recurrent panel that readers are used to seeing in the various Dalton books. This book, for a while at least, almost comes across as an alternative universe Lucky Luke story.

Achdé's art isn't quite as slick as readers would be used to with Morris' long run on the character yet it is closer to Morris' normal style than the earliest Lucky Luke albums that Morris produced which have a much more humorous and caricatured style. I wonder how many readers wouldn't really notice the difference between Morris himself and Achdé ghosting him?

It does feel somewhat like a passing of the baton story, and while it was actually the fourth non-Morris Lucky Luke published in French, it is the first to be published in English by Cinebook. Perhaps they are looking to see the reaction to a non-Goscinny book, although this does seem rather like diving in at the deep end rather than testing the water with one which at least has Morris on art duties.

Lucky Luke Versus The Pinkertons may not be a Morris book but it is still a fun story with humorous artwork and that, at the end of the day, is what we expect from a Lucky Luke book.

• There are more details of the English language Lucky Luke books on Cinebook's website.

• There are more details on the original French language Lucky Luke on the official Lucky Lukewebsite (in French).

It’s not often you get to release a book that causes people to worry about reality and feel unstable after reading it - which is how I felt after reading one of them. It’s almost unthinkable, dangerous even, that you might release two such subversive creations at once. That, however, is just what Markosia Enterprises is planning to do this November. Stay tuned to find out what will be left standing when these monsters collide.

Broadcast: The TV Doodles of Henry Flint

“The mind of Henry Flint is a galaxy of beautiful atrocities – a nightmare factory where the bestial becomes benign, the mundane magical. Henry Flint is at once a full-service doodling savant and a one-man alien zoo, and this never-before-seen collection of his personal work is an attempt to chart a single, crooked leg of the artistic journey he takes daily. Welcome to the best of the bestiary.”

Broadcast offers something very different from Henry Flint’s narrative artwork, familiar to fans worldwide from his books for 2000AD, Vertigo and Dark Horse. With writer Cy Dethan acting as guide to the reader, the book is at once a treasure map and an open invitation to explore Henry’s personal work and zen-like experiments in art.

The Indifference Engine: A Holographic Novel

“Responding to a strangely specific job advertisement, Alan Blake, a distinctly ordinary twenty-something suburban slacker finds himself in the middle of an inter-dimensional task force staffed entirely by superhuman alternate versions of himself. Struggling to fit in, he uncovers a conspiracy that strikes at the very heart of the organisation – a conspiracy that only he can stop.”

“Being a science fiction fan,” says Wayne Hall of Sci-Fi Pulse, “I sometimes ache for a comic that will challenge my perceptions of the world, of the universe, of my way of thinking... The Indifference Engine scratches that itch spectacularly!"

This is Cy Dethan’s third original graphic novel from Markosia and he is joined this time around by hot-shot new artist Rob Carey, along with colourist Mel Cook and letterer Nic Wilkinson. Following the convention-busting performance of the horror-noir Cancertown and the surreal gangland thriller Slaughterman’s Creed, it already looks as if Dethan’s first creator-owned sci-fi story, which I'm happy to declare a gripping, nihilist alternate reality adventure, so let's hope it will be enjoying the same levels of success.

Dethan first explored the genre for Markosia as writer of their Starship Troopers line.

The digital version of the book has already been incredibly popular. Cy Dethan's script is superb, and this is a tightly-written multi-universe-spanning adventure tale and it's...definitely a book to look out for.

Monday, 7 November 2011

As part of their Northern Ireland Political Collection Lunchtime Lecture series, this week Belfast's prestigious Linen Hall Library will feature talks on comics and political cartoons.

The Linen Hall Library, opposite Belfast's City Hall, was founded in 1788 and is the oldest library in Northern Ireland's capital city as well as being the last subscribing library in the island of Ireland.

On Tuesday 8 November 2011 Dr Gordon Gillespie will examine comic books and graphic novels produced in response and reaction to Northern Ireland’s political turbulence while on Friday 11 November Linen Hall Librarian John Killen will take his audience on an historical tour of political cartoons created throughout the 20th century.

Both lectures begin at 1pm and are free.

There are more details of the Linen Hall Library lunchtime lectures at the Linen Hall Library website.

Sunday, 6 November 2011

The creator of Kick-Ass and Wanted creating a comic strip for the BBC children's programme Blue Peter?

As odd as it sounds writer Mark Millar visited the new Blue Peter studio in Manchester on 1 November along with STRIP Magazine artist John McCrea to talk about superhero comics and reveal the first page of a Blue Peter themed comic strip. Talking to presenter Barney Harwood, and with Blue Peter dog Barney dressed in a Superman style cape, the pair discussed superhero comics and introduced a one page comic strip written by Mark and illustrated by John.

The Curse Of Bad Peter shows Barney Harwood receive a summons via his Blue Peter badge which turns him into a superhero who has to battle Bad Peter at Manchester's Arndale Centre. The strip is one page long with a second page ready for viewers to complete the story in any way they see fit.

And yes, both creators did receive a Blue Peter badge.

The Curse Of Bad Peter comic strip is available to download as a PDF from the Blue Peterwebsite.

The episode of Blue Peter that Mark Millar and John McCrea appeared in is available for another week on the BBC iPlayer. They appear approximately 12 minutes into the programme.The annual Blue Peter books used to run comic strips by Bleep and Booster creator Tim. There are more details of the comic strips in the Blue Peter books on Bear Alley.

downthetubes has been reviewing the Dundee University comics events run by Dr Chris Murray for many years, long before they were labelled as the Dundee Comics Day, and those reviews were often the only independent record of those events. Indeed Dundee University regarded those reviews highly enough to link through to them from their own website. So it is good to see that this year's Dundee Comics Day has generated many more reviews and comments than normal.

Laura Sneddon at Comic Book Resourcesprovides a detailed review of the event talks with lots of quotes from the guests.

Ariadne Cass-Maran at Graphic Scotlandreviews the event and points out the lack of female guests without actually suggesting any female creators that could have been invited. Indeed this is the first Dundee event for many years not to have any female guests who, in the past, have included The Beano's Laura Howell, Vampire Academy's Emma Vieceli, Manga Shakespeare's Nana Li and Metaphrog's Sandra Marrs as well as Northumbria University's Dr Mel Gibson.

Rich Clements and Vicky Stonebridge of Inverness' Hi-Ex comics convention show the sense of community that exists amongst comics fans in Scotland by giving DCD a glowing review on the Hi-Ex blog.

Gillian Hatcher of Team Girl Comic, who just might have managed a sneak preview of one of the runner-up entries in the Tartan Bucket Prize, enjoyed her day and hopefully made some useful contacts as well.

Writer and former Tharg David Bishopremembers John Wagner's words of wisdom.

When prompted, enter this unique code COMDT - then make your payment and your subscription will be up and running.

The price quoted offers a 50% discount for three months at £12.50. That’s £68.50 off the shop price.

Please note, although the offer is not restricted to UK delivery (you need a UK bank account), the price increases for overseas delivery although the offer of 50% discount for three months is the same.

*Saving based on discounted Direct Debit price compared with shop price. First quarterly payment discounted by 50% at £12.50 and £25 per quarter thereafter. UK bank accounts only. One year discounted subscription rate of £99.

This heavy buckle has been cast in zinc alloy and then gold plated with an enamelled flag on the front, and the results look impressive. The buckle is 9cm tall x 12cm wide x 1cm thick and can be attached to a 4cm wide belt.

The buckles cost £39.95, post-free world wide and a suitable belt can be ordered for an additional £9.95.

The site downthetubes.net, which began publishing in 1999, is edited by John Freeman whose credits include editor of Doctor Who Magazine, Star Trek Magazine, Star Wars Magazine, and Marvel UK titles such as Overkill, Death's Head II, Warheads and others. He's currently editor of the upcoming Strip Magazine for Print Media Productions.

About the Writers:

• Matthew Badham has written features for Judge Dredd: The Megazine, the Forbidden Planet International blog and more

• Jeremy Briggs contributes news, reviews, interviews and historical articles on British comics. He is a guest writer on Steve Holland's UK comics history blog, Bear Alley, and has written for Comics International, TV Zone, Spaceship Away and Omnivistascope.

• David Hailwood has written comic strips for various publications, including TOXIC, Accent UK, Bulletproof and Futurequake. He also writes comedy material for TV, and regularly contributes to the Temple APA (a showcase for UK comic writers and artists).

• Andy Luke is a writer who draws: he's s created the eponymous Andy Luke's Comic Book, Gran, Absence: a comic about epilepsy, Hold the Phones, It's Alex Jones, and graphic novel, The Watch Thief. He's written about comics too, mainly for Bugpowder.com, and has been involved with the Caption comics festival in Oxford. He currently lives in Belfast with a large box of pasta and a 7ft tall cigarette, and can be found online at http://andy-luke.com and http://awriterwhodraws.com

• Ian Wheeler is a freelance writer who also edited the highly-acclaimed British comics fanzine Eagle Flies Again.